Our campaign for socialism

Marx wrote a great deal, on a wide variety of subjects and over a long period of time.  Some of their writing was in response to political issues of the day which are long forgotten, some were concerned to criticise opponents who held views now rarely encountered, while some were of a very abstract and philosophical nature.  So it can be very difficult for someone with no previous acquaintance with their work to know where to begin.  And diving in at some unsuitable place (Capital, vol. 1, ch. 1, for instance) may discourage further exploration. Marx’s writings cannot be simply divided into those on economics, those on history and those on politics, for these subjects, were for Marx closely interrelated. “Production for use” is a phrase uttered so often by socialists as to become almost a cliché, yet understood (in a superficial fashion) by both enquirers and opponents. It describes our concept – our visualisation – of a future social system superceding the present “un-social” system we call capitalism. The descent of millions of families into relative poverty is beyond appalling.

It is capitalism, not overpopulation that is the cause of present-day pollution, resource depletion, and environmental degradation, and, even if population growth were to become a problem in terms of putting pressure on the Earth's resources, it would only be within the framework of a world of common ownership and democratic control that such a problem could be tackled. Similarly, if people's pessimism were to be confirmed and capitalism really did bring ecological catastrophe, then socialism would still be relevant as only a global approach treating the Earth's resources as the common heritage of all humanity would provide any chance of minimising the damage and saving what could be saved. Capitalism is incapable of tackling the ecological question in a rational way since under it production is carried on by profit-seeking enterprises all competing to maximise their profits. 

Socialism won’t evolve automatically or gradually out of capitalism. Its establishment requires a decisive break — a political and social revolution — that will replace class ownership by social ownership. Our argument is to replace capitalism by a planned money-free society. Technology, if not restricted by the money system, could provide goods and services in such abundance that they could be given away free. But certain people, the rich have a vested interest in preventing abundance since only in conditions of scarcity can they make profits. If goods were abundant, prices would be nil — and so would profits. So the rich seek to prevent abundance and maintain scarcity by all sorts of artificial methods: wars and preparations for war, planned obsolescence, not automating. The unleashing of modern technology would not only allow goods and services to be given away free; it would also allow the abolition of toil. With machines as their slaves, people could lead a life of leisure and creative activity. Modem technology now means that a money-free society in which people’s needs are fully satisfied is possible and it can never materialise under capitalism. As technology advances, capitalism becomes increasingly a system of artificial scarcity and organised waste. One of the things we face is the fact that after over a century of remedial legislation the world is still an unhappy place for most of its inhabitants. The alleged progress has been, to a considerable extent, backwards.

Profit comes out of the difference between what the workers get in wages or salary for producing, and what the owner gets for the sale of the article. Wars, crises and industrial strife arise out of this basic position. They will plague the world until a new system of society is established in which all that is in and on the earth is the common possession of all mankind. Where all will join in co-operative production, privilege will no longer exist, and each will take according to need.

The Socialist Party exists to encourage the working class to establish socialism by democratic political action. We are a political party which advocates socialism and nothing else. Members join on this basis and we are in effect a body dedicated exclusively to spreading socialist ideas by all available means. As a political party, our field of operation is the political arena. Here we oppose all other political parties since they all seek to reform or manage capitalism in one way or another while the only form of political action we support is political action for socialism. This is why we also do not support or join broad campaigning movements which, without aiming at winning political power themselves, aim to bring pressure on governments to adopt certain policies or enact certain reforms. In this sense they too are reformist. This does not mean, however, that we stand apart from such organisations in the physical sense and rely solely on our own meetings and publications. We attend their meetings and demonstrations to make contact and discuss with those involved in them, with a view to pointing out that only in a socialist society will the problems they are rightly concerned about being able to be solved. Indeed, many of our own members first came into contact with socialist ideas in this way.

Trade unions, on the other hand, are not political organisations but organisations formed by groups of workers to negotiate their wages and conditions with employers. Workers in employment have to bargain over the sale of their productive skills and it is clearly better that they do this collectively rather than individually (“unity is strength"). Members of the Socialist Party do participate in trade unions (and similar bodies such as tenants associations, parents associations, claimants unions), but as individual workers directly affected not as party members carrying out some "party line". We do not practice "entryism" like the Trotskyists who infiltrate organisations with the aim of taking them over. On the contrary, our members always insist that such organisations should be run on a fully democratic basis and on the need to avoid being manipulated by politicians and politically-motivated groups. We are, for instance, opposed to unions being affiliated to the Labour Party.